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COTTON MATHER'S ELECTION 
INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 



BY 



GEORGE LYMAN KITTREDGE 



REPRINTED FROM 

THE PUBLICATIONS 

OF 

€^e Colonial M>ocim of Q^as^sfacljusfctCflf 

Vol. XIV 



CAMBRIDGE 

JOHN WILSON AND SON 

^anibtrsitg ^rtss 

1912 



r. 



Gift 
Author 

•AN 30 t9f2 



«^ 

:;* COTTON MATHER'S ELECTION INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 

<• 

«^ When a Boston preacher who died almost two hundred years ago 
can still divide our local republic of letters into hostile camps at a 
moment's notice, the presumption is that he amounted to something. 
Such a man is Cotton Mather. The burning questions that fired his 
contemporaries might be supposed to be extinguished by this time; 
but whoever pokes among the ashes will soon discover the semina 
ignis, quite ready to flare up. For my own part, I am neither pro- 
ISIather nor anti-]\Iather, and my purpose in resuscitating the debate 
about the Doctor's title of F. R. S., which began in his own day, is 
to administer an irenicon.' To this end, I shall produce two fresh 
pieces of evidence which seem to have eluded investigation. They 
are positive, direct, trustworthy, indubitable. They prove con- 
clusively that Cotton ]\Iather was elected a Fellow of the Royal 
Society, and they fix the day, and almost the hour, of the event. 
Before reciting them, however, I must review the whole case. 

In November, 1712, Cotton ]\Iather composed a series of thirteen 
letters on the Natural History of New England and kindred topics. 
Seven of them were addressed to John Woodward, M. D., F. R. S., 
Professor of Physic at Gresham College, and six to Richard Waller, 
Esq., Secretary of the Royal Society. All were intended as com- 
munications to that learned body.^ 

Excerpts from these letters were printed in 1714 in No. 339 of the 
Philosophical Transactions, — the number designated as " for the 
Months of April, May and June." ^ The excerpts were, of course. 



1 The first letter of the series is dated November 17, 1712; the last, November 
29. Our associate, ]\Ir. Frederick Lewis Gay, has copies of these letters and of 
many others which Cotton Mather addressed to the Royal Society, — of all, in 
fact, that are preserved in the MS. Letter-Book of the Society. I am deeply 
grateful to him for lending me these copies and for allowing me to print such 
extracts as I may desire. I shall cite the transcripts as the "Gay MS." 

The original draughts of many of Mather's letters to the Royal Society or its 
members are in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Societj' and the 
American Antiquarian Societj'. I am obliged to our associate, Mr. AVorthington 
C. Ford, for calling my attention to these manuscripts, which I shall cite as .1/. //. S. 
and A. A. S. respectively. Neither society has draughts of the series of 1712. 
There appear to be copies of this series in Sloane MS. 3339. 

* No. 339 of the Philosophical Transactions has the colophon, "London. 



82 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

of a highly miscellaneous character. They deal with fossil teeth and 
bones (believed to be the remains of an antediluvian giant)/ with 
plants and birds, with antipathies and the force of the imagination, 
with the American Indians, with rainbows and sundogs, with the 
strange discovery of a murder by a dream, with the rattlesnake, with 
earthquakes and thunder, with pits in the rocks at Amoskeag "a 
little above the hideous Falls" of the Merrimac, with longevity and 
the multiplication of the human race, and with the mysterious 
figures engraved on Dighton Rock. It is easy to make fun of these 
jottings, which, indeed, are commonly held to betray an abnormal 
credulity. I have no wish to enter the lists in championship of 
Cotton Mather as a man of science. Still, an error is no less an error 
when it has come to be a tiresome fashion. Mather may or may not 
have been exceptionally credulous. Such a charge, at all events, 
gets no support from these Curiosa and others like them. For they 
are precisely the kind of thing that naturalists were noting and 
publisliing at that time, in England and on the Continent, and most 
of them were really worth noting. It is a pity that we do not study 
the history of science a little, before we pitch upon an individual as 
a scapegoat for his age. If we would only look abroad oftener, we 
might find the intellectual life of Massachusetts in INIather's period 
less barren, less glacial, than we do. The significant tiling is, not 
that INIather thought the venom of a rattlesnake would decompose 
the steel edge of a broadaxe, but that his Curiosa were not out of 
place in the Philosophical Transactions, and would not have been out 
of place in the Acta Eruditorum of Leipzig or the Ephemerides of the 
Leopoldina. Even the story of the murder revealed in a dream was 
respectfully treated by the English savants. "The Relation" — 
such is the editor's comment — "seems to be well attested,"^ and 



Printed for W. Innys, at the Princes^ -Arms in St. Paul's Church-yard. 1714." It 
was afterwards assembled with other numbers to make up " Vol. XXIX. For 
the Years 1714, 1715, 1716," which was issued as a whole in 1717. The excerpts 
are on pp. 62-71. They bear the title, "An Extract of several Letters from Cotton 
Mather, D. D. to John Woodward, M. D. and Richard Waller, Esq; S. R. Seer." 
The Letter-Book of the Royal Society (M. 2. 34) contains this article (as printed 
In the Transactions) in MS., prepared for the press (Gay MS., fols. 151-168). 

1 See Lord Combury's letter, quoted by C. R. Weld, History of the Royal 
Society, i. 421 (cf. Sloane MS. 4064, fols. 86, 93). 

2 Philosophical Transactions, xxix. 67. 



1911] COTTON MATHER'S ELECTION INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 83 

the editor was no less a personage than the great astronomer Halley. 
In fact, it is just such an incident as psychologists now register with 
anxious care, and study with trembling hope. Ralph Thoresby, the 
historian of Leeds, believed devoutly in apparitions and in witch- 
craft, and he was an F. R. S. and voted for Cotton Mather — but 
I must not anticipate. 

It is sometimes assumed that Mather sent these scientific papers 
to the Royal Society "solely and merely of his own spontaneous 
motion." This is a mistake. The first letter of the series settles the 
matter. It is addressed to Dr. John Woodward, and begins: 

S', 

Your excellent Essay towards the Natural History of the Earth, has 
obliged and even commanded, y^ true Friends of Religion, and Philosophy, 
to serve you wnth as many Communications as they can, that may be 
subser^^ent unto your noble Intention. But the Letters wherewith you 
have honoured me, have laid me under your more particular commands, 
to supply you with such subterraneous curiosities, as may have been in 
these parts of America mett withal. I do with much Alacrity apply my- 
self immediately to obey your Commands, in one Remarkable Instancp, 
wherein I apprehend myself best able to do it." ^ 

Woodward was particularly interested In palaeontology, and was 
always eager for fossils ^ or for information about them. It was 



1 Mather to Woodward, Nov. 17, 1712, Gay MS., fol. 1 (from Royal Society 
Letter-Book M. 2. 21). 

* In July, 1716, Mather thanks Dr. Woodward for a "most acceptable present " 
(namely, "your Defence of your Natural History of the Earth") and remarks: 
"I am overwhelmed with some Confusion, that I have not all this time 5-eelded 
a due Obedience to y® Commands you laid upon me, to make a Collection of 
o"" Fossils. . . . But I am forming y® best Projection I can, in an Infant Countrey, 
entirely destitute of Philosophers, to have this, and other Intentions answered" 
(M. H. S.). On July 24, 1716, he sends Woodward, with further apologies, a 
piece of Umestone from Sir WUliam Phips's famous treasure ship (M. H. S.). On 
October 15, 1716, Mather sends to John Winthrop (H. C. 1700) "a Book of my 
honour'd EF Woodiuards," adding: "But how oblig'd would both he and I be, if 
Your Inquisitive Ingenuity employing the Liesure of a Gentleman of Erudition 
(which you are) for that purpose, would make as full a Collection as may be of 
the Fossils; (the Names written on each httle Bundle:) to be in Your Name, 
transmitted unto him" (4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 419). 
Winthrop replies on November 5, 1716: "I shall doe my indeavo'' to answer both 
yo" & D'' Woodwards requests in making a collection of y® fossils of o' country 
for Gresham CoUedge . . . and as to y* utensills of y* Pagans, perhaps I may 



84 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

natural that he should apply to the most learned man in New Eng- 
land for such information in the American field, and it was equally 
natural that he should suggest (as he appears to have done) that 
he should like to lay before the Royal Society the communications 
that Mather might favor him with. 

How cordially the Royal Society welcomed Cotton Mather's 
correspondence, may be seen in the following extract from their 
MS. Journal, July 23, 1713: 

A letter drawn up by Mr. Waller for Mr. Cotton Mather at Boston 
in New England was read ; giving an account of the receipt of his letter 
and his manuscript, containing his several observations on Natural sub- 
jects, with an invitation to a future correspondence; which was ordered 
to be sent. 

Mr. Waller proposed the same gentleman as a candidate, according 
to tis desire mentioned in his said letter; which was referred to the next 
Council.^ 

The statement that Waller nominated Mather "according to his 
desire mentioned in his letter " must not be taken (as it usually is ^) 
to indicate that Mather in effect nominated himself. It indicates 
merely that Waller had ascertained what it was incumbent upon him 

grattefye y® doctors curiosity in some of their original! instruments, ancient 
notions & traditions, &c., which I have lately learn't & received among them" 
(6 Collections, v. 332-333). On July 25, 1717, Mather writes to Woodward that 
Winthrop has promised his assistance, "and as a Specimen of more to follow, 
he enables me now ... to transmit unto you a Box, which contains between 
Twenty and Thirty of such Things as you have asked for" (M. H. S.). On 
January 13, 1720, Wintlu-op sent Mather "a Small Box directed to Dr Wood- 
ward;" but Mather did not receive the accompanying letter until May 2, and the 
box had not come to hand by May 9 (4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, 
viii. 438). On AprU 3, 1721, Woodward writes to Winthrop, thanking him for 
shells, and asking for fossils and Indian bones and utensils, and to Mather beg- 
ging him to be "more inquisitive" in seeking fossils (1 Massachusetts Historical 
Proceedings, xiii. 110-111). In the same month, Winthrop writes to Mather: 
"I am making an other sett of rarities and curiositys for the Roy all Society, 
w'''^ I am tliinking to present w**^ my owne hands" (6 Collections, v. 399 note). 

1 N. Darnell Davis, Was Cotton Mather a Fellow of the Royal Society? (The 
Nation, New York, February 18, 1892, Hv. 128; New England Historical and 
Genealogical Register, xl^d. 116.) 

2 By Dr. Slafter, for example, whose account of the matter runs thus: — "Dr. 
Cotton Mather, it seems, as early as 1713, sent a communication to the society, 
containing observations on 'Natural Subjects,' with a desire clearly expressed 
that he might be made a member" (John Checkley, Prince Society, 1897, i. 41). 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into tue royal society 85 

to learn before nominating anybody — namely, the willingness of the 
person in question. For the Statutes of the Royal Society expressly 
provided that one who propounds a person for election into the 
fellowship "shall satisfy the company, that he hath informed [him 
of certain obligations], and that hereupon it is the desire of the said 
person to be of the Society." ^ 

The next meeting of the Council took place only four days later, 
on July 27, 1713, and their Minutes record, on that date, that "Ish. 
Cotton INIather was proposed, balloted for, and approved to be a 
Member of the Society'." ^ 

Secretary Waller's official letter, acknowledging the receipt of 
Mather's manuscript and inviting him to continue his correspondence, 
was received by Mather on October 12, 1713. This was the missive 
that had been approved by the Society on July 23. Along with it, 
we must believe, came a private letter from Waller, informing him 
of the action of the Council and assuring him of a speedy election 
by the Society as a whole, — for Waller doubtless felt sure that the 
•favorable action of the Council had made the result a foregone con- 
clusion. These two letters are referred to as follows in IMather's 
Diary under that date: 

12d. 8m. This Day, in Ships arriving from London, I receive Letters 
from the Secretary of the Royal Society, who tells me. That my Curiosa 
Americana being Readd before that Society, they were greatly Satisfied 
therewith, and ordered the Thanks of the Society to be returned unto me; 
They also Signified their Desire and purpose to Admitt me as a IMember 
of their Body. And, he assures me, tliat at their first lawful Meeting 
for such purposes, I shall be made A Fellow of the Royal Society.^ 

INIather sent Waller a witty and graceful reply, which I am per- 
mitted to print, for the first time, from the original draught in the 
possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society.* 

* Chapter vi, sect. 2 (Diplomata et Statuta Regalis Societatis, 1752, pp. 82- 
83). The Statute was "made in 1663." It is to be inferred that Woodward, 
in requesting Mather for contributions, asked him if he should Ukc to be pro- 
posed for membership, and that Mather, in a personal letter (not known to be 
extant), enclosing the series of thirteen formal letters, replied with a grateful 
afhrmative. At all events, there is no evidence, and no probabilitj', that Mather 
nominated himself. ^ Davis, Eogister, as above, xlvi. 117. 

» As quoted by Wendell, Cotton Mather, p. 244. 

* The draught is undated, but, in the manuscript volume which contains it, 



86 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OP MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

[Separate Letter.] ^ 

An Honour too great for me to have hoped for, the Letters wherew*^ 
you have lately favoured me, have allow'd me some hope of my arriving 
to. -The Academy of y^ Nascosti, at Milain; that of y^ Innominati, in 
Parma; and that of y^ Incogniti, in Venice, would by their Titles, have 
been more fitt for so obscure a person, than a room among your honour-* 
able Virtuosi.^ 

I have nothing to render me worthy of a Relation to so Illustrious a 
Society, as that whereto you have done me the Honoiu" of proposing my 
Admission as a Member, except it be my vast Veneration for the Persons 
that compose it, and my firm Resolution, to have annually as long as I 
may live, contributed unto its Treasures, by my best (tho' mean) 
Comunications, altho' I should never have been in this way obliged 
unto it. 

^ And now you give me a Prospect of reaching to such a Dignity, there 
will be some Addition to my Assiduities, as well as my Capacities, that 
if I be not one of the Ardenti, which they tell me, is a Title worn by one 
of y^ Academies at Naples, yett I will not be one of y® Otiosi; w"^, they 
say, is a Title worn by another of y™. 

I first render my most humble & hearty Thanks unto you, for doing 
y® Part of a Patron on my behalf, in the Recomendation you have been 
pleased to give me: And I assure myself, that an affayr, which will so 
much strengthen my Opportunities to render myself a Master of what 
may be found useful & proper to be transmitted from these parts of y® 
World, under such a Management; as yours, cannot miss of being brought 
unto Perfection. 

I must further pray you to be my Instructor, (for, S', you must im- 
agine that you have now a sort of a tame Indian under your Tuition,) 
what the Rules of my Relation will oblige me to observe, in y® point of 



it follows immediately after the draught of another letter to Waller, entitled by 
Mather "A Woollen Snow" and intended as a communication to the Society. 
This letter about the strange fall of wool in a snowstorm, bears date "Dec. 1. 
1713," and the private letter of thanks to Waller (which I am reproducing) is 
headed, in Mather's hand, "[Separate Letter.]." In printing the letter, I take 
no notice of cancelled words. 

1 The heading (including the brackets) is in Mather's hand. 

2 The passage beginning with "The Academy" and ending with "Virtuosi" 
is in the margin, and the place where it was to be inserted is indicated by two carets 
in the text. 

3 This paragraph is written in the margin, and the place where it was to be 
inserted is indicated by three carets in the body of the letter. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society 87 

those little pecuniary Expences, w*^ which I am to consider y® Treas- 
urer of the Society. 

Your Instruction, which my Ig[norance] ^ at so long a Distance from 
you, rende[rs necessary] for me, will in this, & in ever[y thing] else be 
complied withal, by, S', 

Your most obliged Fr[iend] ^ 

The next document in the case is a letter from Secretary Waller 
to Cotton Mather. It is not preserved, so far a^ I know, but we 
have Samuel Mather's account of it, with an all-important extract: 

'TwAS in the Year 1714. he received a Letter from the Secretary of the 
Roj/al Society, [Richard Waller, Esq;] ^ dated Deccmb. 4. 1713. in which 
are these Words; As for your being chosen a Member of the Royal Society, 
that has been done both by the Council and Body of the Society: only the 
Ceremony of an Admission is wanting; which, you being beyond Sea, 
cannot be performed.* 

\Yhen did Cotton IVIather receive this momentous letter from ]\Ir. 
Secretary Waller? The question can be answered with exactness 
enough for the purposes of our investigation. The letter certainly 
reached him before July 2, 1714, ^'^^ ^'^ ^^^ probability before March 
30.^ The importance of thus approximating the date will appear 
presently. 



1 The lower right-hand comer of the leaf is torn off. The words and letters 
in brackets are conjectural. 

^ No signature. 

' The brackets are Samuel Mather's. 

* Samuel Mather, Life of Cotton Mather, 1729, p. 77. Whether Samuel 
Mather is quoting from the original or from his father's Diary we cannot tell, 
for the Diary of 1714 is extant only for January and part of P>bruary. 

s On March 30, 1714, Mather asks John AMnthrop (H. C. 1700) for a descrip- 
tion of the Connecticut moose, since he is "shortly writing for London, unto, 
you know who" (4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 417). You know 
who is doubtless Waller, for a letter from Mather to him (dated June 21, 1714) 
consists entirely of notes on the moose. It begins with an expression of satis- 
faction at learning of Waller's good health, "which," writes Mather, "has been 
demonstrated in your particular Enquiries, after the MOOSE in our Countrey" 
(Royal Society Letter-Book, M. 2. 35; Gay MS., fol. 169). These inquiries were, 
in all likelihood, contained in Waller's letter of December 4, 1713, which must 
therefore have come into Mather's hands before the latter wrote to Winthrop on 
March 30, 1714. 

On July 2, 1714, Mather writes again to Winthrop, remarking: — "I enclose 
a large Letter from one of the Secretaries of the Royal Society; which you will 



88 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

To understand Waller's letter, we must have recourse to the 
Statutes of the Society ("made in 1663" and in force during the whole 
period that concerns us in this inquiry), as well as to its Second 
Charter (also of 1663).\^The Statutes provide that a candidate for 
fellowship shall be voted on (by ballot) at some meeting subsequent 
to that at which he is nominated,^ and the Charter prescribes a 
two-thirds vote.^ Reference of nominations to the Council was not 
required, either by Charter or by Statute, but it seems to have been 
customary, and it certainly took place in the present instance. 
Further requirements of the Statutes are that "every person elected 
a Fellow" shall "subscribe the obligation" to do his duty by the 
Society,^ and that he shall go through the ceremony of admission. 
The sections defining admission are as follows: 

V. Every person, elected a Fellow, shall appear for his Admission at 
some ordinary meeting of the Society, which shall be within four weeks 

please to return unto me, by a safe Conveyance" (4 Collections, viii. 419). This 
large letter was, of course, the letter from Waller, dated December 4, 1713, which 
Samuel Mather quotes. 

Either of the two limits thus fixed (March 30, 1714, or July 2) is near enough 
for our purpose. The earlier date, however, is much the more probable. 

I am tempted to finish the story of the Moose, which is rather curious. Math- 
er's letter to Waller concerning that animal (June 21, 1714), preserved in the 
Letter-Book of the Royal Society (M. 2. 35), is endorsed: "Mather: read Oct: 
28. 1714. Enter'd L. B. 15. 47. Phil. Trans." This memorandum shows that 
it was read at a meeting of the Society, and indicates that it was to be pubhshed 
in the Philosophical Transactions. This, however, was not done, and in July, 
1716, Mather recopied the httle essay, and entrusted it (with other communica- 
tions for the Society) to Samuel Woodward (Secretary of the Province), who was 
on the point of setting out for London (M. H. S.). .Even then the article failed 
of publication, and it was reserved for Paul Dudley to enrich the Philosophical 
Transactions with a description of the moose. His account was communicated 
to the Society by John Chamberlayne, and may be found in No. 368 (for May- 
August, 1721, xxxi. 165-168), printed in 1722 or 1723. It was supplemented by 
a paper from Samuel Dale in No. 444 (xxxix. 384-389). 

1 Diplomata et Statuta Regalis Societatis Londini . . . Jussu Praesidis et 
Concilii edita, 1752. The copy in the Harvard College Library was given by 
Thomas Hollis in June, 1765, and contains a characteristic inscription in his 
beautiful handwriting: — "Liber Thomae Hollis, Angli, Hospitii Lincolniensis, 
Regalis et Antiquariorum Societatum Sodalis; libertatis, patriae, praestantisque 
ejus constitutionis laudatissime anno 1688 recuperatae amatoris studiosissimi." 

2 Chap, vi., sects. 1, 4 (pp. 82-83). 
^ Diplomata et Statuta, p. 28. 

* Chap, ii (pp. 76-77). There is also a requirement as to fees (chap, iii, pp. 77- 
79), but this is of no importance in the present inquiry. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society S9 

after his Election; or within such further time, as shall be granted by the 
Society or Council, upon cause shewed to either of tliem. Otherwise his 
Election shall be void. 

VI. The Admission of any Fellow of the Society shall be at some 
meeting tliereof, in manner and form following: The President, taking 
him by the hand, shall say these words, 

I do by the authority, and in the name of the Royal Society of London 
for improving natural knowledge, admit you a Fellow thereof.^ 

These rules explain Waller's words in his letter of December 4, 1713, 
quoted by Samuel Mather: — "Only the Ceremony of an Admission 
is wanting; which, you being beyond Sea, cannot be performed." 
This ceremony, we have seen, had to take place within four weeks 
of a candidate's election (otherwise the election was void); but the 
time could be extended indefinitely, for cause, either by the Society 
or by the Council. In Mather's case, such an extension, if not ex- 
pressly mentioned at the time, must have been taken for granted by 
everybody concerned; for he could not even learn of his election 
until the regular limit had expired. 

Ever\i;hing now seemed to be in good order. Mather had been 
officially notified by the Secretary that he had been elected a Fellow 
of the Royal Society in the regular w^ay. WTienever he should go to 
London, it would be incumbent on him to present himself for formal 
"admission," to sign the pledge of fidelity, and to receive the right- 
hand of fellowship. He would then become an F. R. S. in the fullest 
legal and technical sense of the term. Meanwhile, he felt justified 
in appending these honorable letters to his name. He did so immedi- 
ately, on the title-page of The Glorious Throne,^ a sermon delivered 
on September 23, 1714, and published that year, and he continued 
the practice, on fitting occasions, as long as he lived. 

We now see the importance of fixing approximately (as we have 
already done) the date on which IMather received Waller's notice of 
election.^ And we observe that it makes no difference whether we 
choose March 30 or July 2, 1714, as the terminus ad quevi; for The 



1 Chap, vi., sects. 5-6 (p. 83). 

^ Sibley, No. 262. Mr. George Parker Winship, Mr. Clarence S. Brigham, 
and Mr. Albert Matthews have helped me to determine the earliest pubUcation 
in which Mather styled himself F. R. S. 

' See p. 87, above. 



90 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

Glorious Throne was not published before September 29.^ Mather 
did not presume on Waller's assurance (received in 1713) ^ that he 
was goiiig to be elected: he waited, as was proper, until the Secretary 
had informed him that the election was an accomplished fact. 

It is impossible to see how Mather can be blamed for using the 
title of F. R. S., even if he had nothing to go on except Waller's 
letter of December 4, 1713; for it was inconceivable that there should 
have been any mistake: Waller was not only the Secretary, but he 
was the person who had nominated Mather. But Waller was by no 
means his only voucher. He received assurances of a similar tenor 
from Dr, Woodward. This appears from an important letter, dated 
May 21, 1723, from Mather to Dr. James Jurin,^ Secretary of the 
Society, printed by Mr. N. Darnell Davis in 1892.* In this docu- 
ment, to which we shall have occasion to recur, Mather tells of com- 
municating to Waller and Woodward "a great number of American 
and Philosophical Curiosities" (evidently the Curiosa, the thirteen 
letters written in November, 1712, and excerpted in the Philosophical 
Transactions in 1714), and adds: 

These Gentlemen putt the, as Unexpected as Undeserved Respect 
upon ^ me, of proposing me for a Member of the Royal Society ; and they 
both Wrote unto me, That I was chosen accordingly both by the Council 

^ The verso of the title-page has the following certification: — "Published 
by Order of His Excellency the Govemour & Council. Isaac Addington, Seer. 
Boston: Sept. 29th. 1714." 

2 See p. 85, above. 

=> Born 1684, M. D. 1716, F. R. S. 1717 or 1718, Secretary from November 30, 
1721, to Nov. 30, 1727, died 1750 (Weld, History of the Royal Society, i. 435 
note 1, ii. 561; Dictionary of National Biography, xxx. 229-230). 

4 The Nation, New York, February 18, 1892, liv. 127-128 (republished in the 
New England Historical and Genealogical Register, xlvi. 115-116, and by Slafter, 
John Checkley, Prince Society, 1897, i. 41-44). I use the transcript in the Gay 
MS., fols. 173-178. The original is preserved in the Letter-Book of the Royal 
Society, M. 2. 36. 

^ To -put upon, in those days, meant either to "confer upon" or to "inflict 
upon," according to the context. "Unexpected" requires a note, for it is easily 
misunderstood, and every word that Mather wrote is Ukely to encounter hostile 
scrutiny. The adjective appUes, not to Waller's nomination of Mather on July 23, 
1713 (for that was not unexpected, nor, under the Statutes, could it be unexpected: 
see p. 85, above). What Mather means is that the first suggestion that he should 
allow himself to be proposed as a candidate came as a surprise to him — and this 
is probably true (see p. 84), for it was an honor never yet conferred upon a 
bom American. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal socifty 91 

and Body of the Society, on the Anniversary Day * for such elections, 
in tlie year 1713.- — Adding, that the only Reason of my not having my 
name in the Printed List of the Society, was because of my being be^'ond- 
Sea, and yett a Natural Born Subject, & so not capable of being inserted 
among tlie Gentlemen of other Nations.^ 

Nor was this all. In the Table of Contents in No. 339 of the 
Philosophical Transactions, issued in 1714, — the number that con- 
tains the excerpts from Mather's Curiosa, — there stand, in plain 
type, the words: ''An Extract of several Letters from Cotton Mather, 
D. D. F. R. S.," ^ and of course this announcement remained when, 
in 1717, Nos. 338-350 were bound together and published as Volume 
XXIX. The Philosophical Transactions, though not actually issued, 
at this time, by the Royal Society, was universally understood to be 
its organ,^ and the editor was the Secretary of the Society, the illus- 
trious Halley.^ *'You[r] Secretary also," writes Mather to Jurin, 
"D*" Halley, in the Philosophical Transactions of 1714 printed my 

1 This is probably not quite accurate, for the Statutes of 1G63 provide that 
"no person shall be proposed, elected, or admitted a Fellow of the Society upon 
St. Andrew's day, or the day of the anniversary meeting for electing the Council 
and Officers" (Chap, vi., sect. 9; Diplomata et Statuta, 1752, p. 84). The 
inaccuracy, however, is of no moment, as we shall see presently. 

2 I do not know whether this letter from Woodward is extant or not. But we 
may be sure that Mather does not misrepresent its tenor. He and Woodward 
had long been on friendly terms, and they so continued as long as Mather lived. 
Mather hoped for favorable action from the Royal Society on the question 
broached in this letter to Jurin. There was every probability that Woodward 
would see the letter. It might even be read in the Society. And of course Mather 
was counting on Woodward's support in case there was opposition or difficulty. 
For him to alienate his champion by misrepresentations would have been suicidal. 

' The annual Lists of the Royal Society each consisted of two parts, — Brit- 
ish subjects and foreigners. Professor Carleton F. Brown has had the kind- 
ness to examine for me a file of these Lists (in the British Museum) for 1713- 
1730, and he informs me that Mather's name occurs in none of them. 

* xxix. 51. True, in the title at the head of the article itself (p. 62), we have 
"Cotton Mather, D. D." without the F. R. S., but this is balanced by the fact 
that Woodward, in the same title, is designated simply as "John Woodward, 
M. D.," also without the F. R. S., though he had been a Fellow for years. 

* On tliis point see Weld, History of the Royal Society, i. 518-522. 

« Richard Waller was Secretary from November 30, 1687, to November 30, 
1709; and again from November 30, 1710, to November 30, 1714. Halley was 
Secretary from November 30, 1713, to November 30, 1721. Thus Halley's term 
began before Waller's second term expired. There are other instances of such 
overlapping. See Weld, ii. 561. 



92 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

Name, with an F. R. S. annexed unto it." ^ And he continues: "Mr. 
Peiiver did the Hke, in his Natures Collectanea; And in his Letters to 
me, he had these Words, 'Your Election succeeded without opposi- 
tion, and you were Elected after the usual Method of Balloting. 
The Reason of your being out of the Printed List, is your not being 
personally here, to subscribe to the Orders ^ that should be tendred 
you.'" 

"Mr. Petiver" is James Petiver, F. R. S., the distinguished botan- 
ist and entomologist.^ Mather sent him (on September 24, 1716) a 
few dried American plants,^ with observations upon them and a 
personal letter.^ In the letter, Mather adverts to the fact that his 
name has never appeared in the printed list of Fellows. His words 
are these: 

In y^ mean time, I shall not be altogether wanting in my Essayes to 
do y^ best I can in Obedience to yom- Commands. And I hope, annu- 
ally to treat y^ Royal Society also with such a Number of Coinunications, 
that if every Member of that Illustrious Body, whose Name stands in the 
Catalogue (an Honour not yett granted unto mine), will do but half as 
much, the Stores in your Collection will soon grow considerable. 

1 Letter of May 21, 1723 (see p. 94, and note 4, above). 

^ This refers to the language of the Statute requiring every Fellow elect to 
"subscribe the Obligation." The pledge includes the words "we will observe 
the Statutes and Orders of the said Society" (Chap, ii., Diplomata et Statuta, 
1752, p. 77). 

3 F. R. S. 1695, died 1718. See Dictionary of National Biography, xlv. 85-S6. 
Cf. Thoresby's Diary, ii. 32, 147-148. 

* This is the "Hortus Siccus of American plants" mentioned by Mather in a 
catalogue of his communications to the Royal Society enclosed in his letter to 
Jurin, May 21, 1723. Mr. Darnell Davis ignores this catalogue, but I have 
been able to consult it in the Gay MS. (fols. 178-181). 

8 Mather's draught of the letter and the observations is in M. H. S. The 
letter itself is among Petiver's papers in the British Museum (Sloane MS. 4065, 
fol. 255). It is marked "Rec^ S Jan: 15. 17lf." The sign ^ stands for Tuesday. 
I am indebted to our Corresponding Member, Mr. Herbert Putnam, Librarian of 
Congress, for copies of Sloane MSS. 

Mather is so often regarded as a pushing kind of person that it is worth while 
to remark that in this instance, as in the correspondence with Woodward which 
seems to have led to his nomination (see p. 83, above), he did not obtrude him- 
self. Petiver wrote to him first. This appears from the opening sentence of 
Mather's letter: "Tis high time for me, to make some [Return, that may ex- 
presse my sense of the obUgations, which your Letters with what accompanied y*", 
have laid upon me." 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society 93 

It was in reply to this observation, we may be certain, that Petiver 
assured Mather that the election had been perfectly regular, and 
that the omission of his name from the printed list was explained by 
inability to be "personally here, to subscribe to the Orders that 
should be tendred you." It is peculiarly significant, in view of ]Math- 
er's letter, that when, in the very next year (1717), Petiver included 
in his Nature Collectanea a list of the plants which he had received 
from Mather, he took special pains to accord his American cor- 
respondent the title of Fellow of the Royal Society at full length by 
prefixing an acknowledgment as follows: 

Some American Plants, with their Specifick Vertues and Wonderful 
Effects, lately sent me by the Reverend and learned Dr. Cotton Mather, at 
Boston in New England, and Fellow of the Royal Society, London.^ 

From 1714 to 1724 INIather was in active correspondence with the 
Royal Society and its members, and there is reason to believe that 
he was frequently addressed by such members as an F. R. S. Samuel 
Mather avers: 

After this ^ he had several Letters from many considerable Gentle- 
men of that Society, who always Superscribed their Letters to him as 
F. R. S. And he was assured by several of them, that he ought to affix 
that Title to his Name before his Works: otherwise he would never have 
done it. . . . 

I have at this Time in my Hand, Letters to him from Mr. Waller, 
Dr. Chamberlain, Dr. Woodward, Dr. Jurin, and others who give 
Dr. Mather his Title, and express Concern some sordid People here will 
not allow it.^ 

I give the testimony of Samuel INIather for what it is worth, for I 
am well aware that whatever one member of this family saj's in 
behalf of anj^ of his relatives is traditionally received, in this part 
of the world, with some caution. • Still, it would be credulous in- 
credulity to reject this evidence altogether, particularlj^ since it 
accords, in its general purport, with what seems probable. Let me 



^ Petiveriana III, seu Natiirae Collectanea; Domi Forisque Auctori Com- 
municata, London, 1717, p. 12, col. 2 (Harvard College Libran')- 

2 That is, after the receipt of ^^'aller'3 letter of December 4, 1713, which 
Samuel Mather has just quoted. 

8 Life of Cotton Mather, 1729, p. 78. 



94 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHESETTS [Dec. 

hasten to add that (for a reason which will appear later) we are here 
concerned with only such of these letters as were written before 
April 11, 1723, and that, in the absence of the letters themselves, we 
cannot be sure which of them preceded that date.^ One of Chamber- 
layne's letters, however (of August 31, 1720), is fortunately quoted 
by Cotton Mather in a letter to John Winthrop (H. C. 1700), dated 
December 26, 1720. It is of much importance in settling the question 
whether Mather was or was not regarded at this time as an F. R. S. 
by the Fellows of that Society. Mather writes: 

All the Return I have yett had of the Remittances I made the last 
February to the R. S.,- is an obliging Letter of Mr. Chamberlain,^ Aug. 31, 
whose words are, " I thank you for your Noble Entertainment with which 
so many of my Friends were Regaled, before I could gett a Snap for 
myself, who himgerd & thirsted for it, that I had not the pleasure thereof 
till very lately, and indeed too late to communicate the same pleasure 
to your Illustrious Brethren, the Gentlemen of the R. S. who have always 
a long Recess at this time of the year." ^ 

Chamberlayne's words "your Illustrious Brethren, the Gentlemen 
of the Royal Society" are certainly equivalent to calling Mather an 
F. R. S. The same turn of phrase is used by Mather himself in The 
Christian Philosopher, 1721, when (after describing himself on the 



1 We know, however, that all of Waller's must have fallen within this limit, 
for he died before April 3, 1721 (see 1 Massachusetts Historical Proceedings, 
xiii. Ill), — I think about 1715 (see p. Ill note 3, below). So of most of Chamber- 
layne's, for he died November 2, 1723 (Weld, History of the Royal Society, i. 
414 note 29; Foster, Alumni Oxonienses, i. 257 b; Dictionary of National Biog- 
raphy, X. 9) . That the letters from Jurin come later than May 21, 1723, is a natural 
(but uncertain) inference from the general tenor of Mather's letter to him of that 
date, and in particular from the way in which it begins. 

2 These "remittances" were twelve letters of Curiosa Americana to which 
Mather often refers in his correspondence with Winthrop (see 4 Massachusetts 
Historical Collections, viii. 435, 443, 448, 450, 452, 453, 455). They are enumer- 
ated in a catalogue enclosed in Mather's letter to Jurin, May 21, 1723 (Gay MS., 
fol. 180), but they appear to have perished. An unpublished letter from Mather 
'to Henry Newman, February 17, 1720, sent with these conamunications and 
requesting him to hand them to Chamberlayne, is in the possession of the 
American Antiquarian Society. See p. 105 note 8, below. 

3 John Chamberlayne, born about 1666, F. R. S. 1702, died November 2, 
1723 (Weld, History of the Royal Society, i. 414, n. 29; Foster, Alu mni Oxoni- 

.enses, i. 257 b; Dictionary of National Biography, x. 9). 
^ 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 444. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election in^to ThE royal society 95 

title-page as "Fellow of the Royal Society") he speaks of a certain 
F. R. S. as "my Brother." ^ It is particularly interesting, in view of 
Chamberlayne's language (just quoted) to observe that it was into 
the form of a letter to him that IMather put his tract entitled The 
World Alarm'd (1721), which is described on the title-page as "a 
Letter to an Honourable Fellow of the Royal Society at London. 
From a Member of the same Society, at Boston." ^ 

We must frankly admit that, if Cotton blather was (as he sup- 
posed) a properly elected F. R. S., there was nothing irregular, 
according to the practice of the Society itself, in his being adorned 
with those letters, even in default of the ceremony of "admission." 
The Rev. William Brattle, of Cambridge, was elected a Fellow on 
March 11, 1714,^ and, so far as I know, his right to bear the title of 
F. R. S. (which stands after his name in the Harvard Quinquennial 
Catalogue) has not been questioned. Yet it is pretty clear that 
Brattle was never formally "admitted." He was in this country 
when his election took place,^ and it seems quite certain that he did 



1 P. 219. 

2 The tract is addressed "To J. C. Esq;" and the identity of J. C. with Cham- 
bcrlayne is established by the two following passages: (1) "Had we yet Living 
and Shining among us, the Admirable Nicuentyt, who has by yom- Excellent Care 
and Exquisite Skill, become an Instructor of our Nation," etc. (p. 14); (2) "Were 
I Master of as many Languages, as were Employ'd by the Learned for the Cele- 
bration of the Peyreskius, whom you have in so many things made your Pattern : 
Yea, or of as many Languages as you have lately given us, in a Collection which 
will Immortalize your Name far more than so many Statues," etc. (p. 16). The 
first passage refers to Chamberlayne's translation of Bernard Nieuwentyt'a 
RcUgious Philosopher, 1718-1719; the second to his publication of the Lord's 
Prayer in many languages (Oratio Dominica in diversas omnium fere gentium 
linguas versa, Amsterdam, 1715). 

Mather liimself describes the letter ("A Relation of a New Burning Island") 
as addressed "to M'' Chamberlain" in the catalogue enclosed in his letter to 
Jurin, May 21, 1723 (Gay MS., fol. 180) and in a list of Curiosa in A. A. S. he 
designates "The World alarum'd, — with a New Burning Island" as a "L[etter] 
to INP Chamberlain." 

The World Alarm'd is anonjinous, but only formally so; for the author 
plainly identifies himself with "The Christian Pliilosopher" on the last page of 
the epistle (p. 16), and immediately facing that page is a list of books "To be 
Sold by Samuel Gerrish," the first of wliich is "The Christian Philosopher . . . 
By Cotton Mather, D. D. and Fellow of the Royal Society." 

» Thomas Tliomson, History of the Royal Society, 1812, Appendix, p. xxxiii; 
N. Darnell Davis, Register, xlvi. 117. 

* He was present at a meeting of the President and Fellows of Harvard College 



96 THE COLOXLA.L SOCIETY OF iL^SSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

not visit England between IMarch 11, 1714, and February 15, 1717 
(when he died ^). Paul Dudley was elected a Fellow on November 2, 
1721,^ and his name occurs with the title F. Pt. S. several times in 
the Philosophical Transactions.' Dudley lived until 1751, and I 
cannot undertake to say that he never went to England in the interim. 
K so, however, nobody has recorded the fact. And, at any rate, I 
feel sure that (if he eventually did take the voyage) he had not done 
so before the Secretary had described him as F. R. S. in the Trans- 
actions at least half-a-dozen times. These examples are instructive 
with regard to the custom of the time in this matter. 

It does not appear that anybody challenged Cotton Mather's 
right to style himself an F, Pt. S. until 1720, although in the interim 
(beginning, as we have observ^ed, in 1714, immediately after the 
receipt of Secretary Waller's notification of his election) he had ap- 
pended the letters to his name on several title-pages.^ In this year, 
however, the question was raised by John Checkley in a very curious 



on March 16, 1713-14 (President Leverett's MS. Diary, Harvard College 
Library). 

^ On this day Sewall records his death, — "last night at midnight" (Diary, 
iii. 120). 

2 Thomson, as above, p. xxxv; J. T. Hassam, 2 Massachusetts EKstorical 
Proceedings, xvi. 35. 

3 Nos. 364 (xxxi. 27), 367 (xxxi. 145), 368 (xxxi. 165), 374 (xxxii. 231), 376 
(xxxii. 292), 384 (xxxiii. 129), 385 (xxxiii. 194), 387 (xxxiii. 256), 398 (xxxiv. 261), 
437 (xxxix. 63). In each case the letters are attached to Dudley's name in the 
title of one of his communications. In the last-cited instance, Dudley, in de- 
scribing the earthquake of October 29, 1727, in a letter to the Secretary, dated 
"Roxbury, Nov. 13, 1727," makes use of the following language: "I think it 
my Duty, and hope it will be acceptable to the Society, to have the Particulars 
from one of their own Members." 

* The Glorious Throne (1714) has already been mentioned (p. 89, above). 
The following volumes also apf>end F. R. S. to Mather's name (there are doubt- 
less others — I do not aim to be exhaustive) : — Pascentius, Nuncia Bona e 
Terra Longinqua, Parentalia, Shaking Dispensations, The Religion of the Closet, 
4th edition (all 1715); Fair Dealing, Life Swiftly Passing (1716); Hades Look'd 
Into, The Valley of Baca (1717); Concio ad Populum, Desiderius, Mirabilia 
Dei (1719); Undoubted Certainties (1720). l^. 1721 and 1722 I note the fol- 
lowing books in which Mather lays claim to this honor: — The Christian 
Philosopher (probably pubUshed in 1720, though dated 1721); Genuine Chris- 
tianity, India Christiana, A Vision in the Temple (1721). Coheleth (1720) 
and The Angel of Bethesda (1722) are described on the title-page as "by a 
Fellow of the Royal Society." For The World Alarm'd (172i), see p. 95 note 2, 
above. 



1911] COTTON AIATHER's ELECTION INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 97 

fashion. In 1719 ^ Checkley had attacked Mather and Thomas 
Walter, Mather's nephew, in the preface to his Choice Dialogues.^ 
Walter replied to the Dialogues in 1720. This reply was believed by 
Checkley to be "the joint Labours of the grand Committee" of 
ministers, "but taggd together by IM"" Walter and by him adorned 
with those many Billingsgate Flowers which have so Selicatel}'' per- 
fum'd the whole Piece." ^ Checkley also conceived himself to have 
been hardly used by the action of the Court of General Sessions in 
the matter of the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and he ascribed 
his prosecution — not, I dare say, to Cotton Mather in particular 
but to the dominant party in general, among whom Mather was a 
leader. However exalted Checkley 's motives may have been, he was 
quite as bigoted as any of his opponents, and there is no doubt that 
he was only too eager to discover w^eapons to use against IMather. 
Now Mather's name, as we have seen, was not appearing in the 
annual List of Fellows of the Royal Society. He had commented on 
the omission himself, in letters to some of the Fellows in England, 
and had received explanations which justified him in still styling 
himself F. R. S., particularly as his correspondents in the Society so 
addressed him. W^hether Checkley had inspected one of the annual 
lists or not, we cannot tell. Probably he had. We know that the 
omission of Mather's name in them was public property in Boston 
as early as February, 1722, and ]Mather himself asserts, in a letter in 
which he mentions Checkley, that it was this omission that gave 
rise to the attack upon the genuineness of his title."* At any rate, 
Checkley knew (like everybody else) that IMather had styled him- 
self F. R. S. on various title-pages, and he smelt imposture. Accord- 
ingly, on August 22, 1720, he wrote to Colonel Francis Nicholson, 
then in London, and begged him to ascertain the facts.^ Nicholson, 
I fancy, "did not like the office" — to borrow lago's phrase. Be- 
sides, the letter reached him when he was very busy. He had just 

^ The book bears no date. Dr. Slafter assigns it to 1719 or 1720 (John Check- 
ley, Prince Society, 1897, i. 34, ii. 230). The latter is the latest possible date and 
is more probable than the former. 

2 Slafter, i. 145-148. 

» Letter to the Rev. James McSparran, June 26, 1721 (Slafter, i. 154-155). 

* See p. 100 note 2, below. 

* Checkley's letter to Nicholson has not been found, but he mentions it, and 
gives the date, in his letter to Halley. 



98 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

been sworn (on September 27, 1720 ^) as Governor of South Carolina, 
and he was getting ready for departure. He sailed from Plymouth 
for America in March, 1721,^ and "just before his sailing" he sent 
Checkley "a verbal Message by a Gentleman, that the Hurry of his 
Affairs at that Time had hindered him from procuring" Checkley 
the needed information, "but that He wou'd desire Cap* Halley to 
send [Checkley] a Certificate relating to the Business." ^ 

Now the gentleman ^ with the "verbal message" must have reached 
Boston at almost the same time as the ship which brought a hundred 
copies of Mather's Christian Philosopher, printed in London. This 
ship came into port in the course of the five days immediately pre- 
ceeding March 31, 1721.^ Checkley was a bookseller and a reading 

^ South Carolina Historical Collections, ii. 150; Acts of the Privy Council, 
ii. 794. 

2 This I infer from a letter from Nicholson to Alban Butler, dated Plymouth, 
March 8, 1721 (MS. Letter-Book of the Royal Society, N. 1. 89, cited by Andrews 
and Davenport, Guide to the Manuscript Materials, 1908, p. 365), which was 
manifestly written just before sailing, — as well as from the date on which Nichol- 
son arrived in South Carolina, May 22, 1721 (South Carolina Historical Collec- 
tions, i. 232). 

3 Checkley's letter to Halley, AprU 26, 1721 (Slafter, ii. 151-152). 

^ Probably he came with Captain Bourn, who arrived on April 8, 1721, seven 
weeks from London; or with Captain Tuthill, of the snow Anna, who arrived 
on April 14th, nine weeks from London (see Sewall, Diary, ui. 287, 288). 

' Jeremiah Dummer wrote to Mather from London on September 12, 1720, 
with regard to The Christian Philosopher: "Your Book is compleatly printed; 
but I don't yett publish it, because in the Recess of Parlaiment, all people of 
Distinction are out of Town, and if it should come abroad now, it would be an 
old Book before the parlaiment meets. This is a piece of prudence that the best 
Authors are obhged to use. Besides, I have not yett determined upon the Patron" 
(quoted by Mather in a letter to Jolin Winthrop, December 26, 1720: 4 Massa- 
chusetts Historical Collections, viii. 445). A patron was soon found, for the 
dedication ("To Mr. Thomas Hollis, Merchant in London"), signed by the Rev. 
Thomas Bradbury, is dated "London, Sept. 22. 1720." Doubtless the book was 
published before the end of the year, and the "1721" in the imprint was the 
customary bookseller's trick of post-dating. Checkley (in his letter to Halley) 
Bays it was pubhshed in 1720 (Slafter, ii. 152), and Samuel Mather puts it under 
that year (Life of Cotton Mather, p. 174). Cotton Mather himself, in an 
unpublished letter of December 10, 1720, to Josiah Everleigh of Crediton, 
England (in the collection of the American Antiquarian Society), remarks: — 
" There is newly published (as I am told, for I have not yett seen it,) in London, a 
Book entituled. The Christian Philosopher." The first consignment of the 
books left England in that winter, but the ship was blown off the New England 
coast, took refuge in Antigua, and did not arrive in Boston until March 26-31, 1721. 
This appears from Mather's Diary, March 31, 1721 (which was Friday) : — "My, 



1911] COTTON aiATHER's ELECTION INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 99 

man. He soon got hold of one of these volumes and noted that the 
title-page described the author as a "Fellow of the Royal Society." 
Here was a fresh document in his case against jNIather. Checkley 
was too ardent a controversiahst to wait patiently for the results of 
Nicholson's promised letter to the Secretary of the Society, — which, 
indeed, might never have been written at all. He took the inquiry 
into his own hands and, on April 26, 1721, he directed a fervid appeal 
to Halley, a perfect stranger, enclosing a copy of the epistle that he 
had previously despatched to Nicholson, and continuing in the ex- 
traordinary terms that follow: 

Thus (SO you have both my Petition & the Cause of it. And now 
I most humbly entreat of you (Cap' Halley) to send me a Certificate 
under your own Hand, relating to M' Mather's being a Fellow or not a 
Fellow of the royal Society. Mr Mather hath published a Book in London 
in 1720, entituled the Christian Philosopher, in which He writes Him- 
self at Length, Fellow of the royal Society. Teacher Bradbury WTites 
a Preface to it mscrib'd to M^ Hollis. S^ your sendmg me the Certificate 
by the very first Opportunity, will capacitate me to defend myself from 
these Sons of Strife, Schism & Sedition, and will mdeed be an Act of 
Charity to a distressed, persecuted (but I thank God a true) Son of our 
Holy Mother the Church of England, and your unknown, but very 
humble & devoted Serv*.^ 

The tone of this impertinent request shows how uncharitably cer- 
tam Checkley felt that Mather had been sailing under false colors. 
It is amusing to notice that he desires Halley to address his reply 

Christian Philosopher, in a vessel blown off our Coast last Winter,) is this Week 
arrived from England; an Hundred of the Books are come," and from his letter 
to Jolin Winthrop, April 17, 1721: — "Our Christian PniLosopuER (blown off 
the last Winter to Antigua) is newly arrived. And tho' I am not myself made 
owner of more than one, yett our Bookseller has one Hundred" (4 Ma.ssachusett3 
Historical Collections, viii. 447). The bookseller was Samuel Gerrish: see his 
advertisement at the end of The Worid Alarm'd, 1721 (p. 95 note 2, above). 

' Slafter, ii. 152-153. It is well to remember that Checkley was involved, in 
some fai^liion, in the proceedings against Mather in the vexatious business of 
Nathan Howells's estate. On December 31, 1720, Checkley writes to John Read: 
"The papers against M^ Mather I have still by me, the reason this; I shewed 
them toM"" Heame, who said it wou'd be to no purpose to proceed without one 
of the Witnesses cou'd be present to prove the Bond. I wish this Affair had been 
committed to some other Person, lest my appearing in it ehou'd seem to proceed 
from Spite & ill Will" (Slafter, ii. 145). 



100 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

to "Docf John Checkley," thus himself assuming a title which was 
popularly given to him (as an apothecary) in Boston, but which, 
educated as he was in England, he must have known would hardly 
have been accorded him in the mother country.^ 

It is highly improbable that Halley deigned to answer Checkley's 
letter. But it appears to have been read at a meeting of the Society ,2 



1 The Rev. Samuel Lee, in writing to Dr. Nehemiah Grew, June 25, 1690, 
about the medical profession in Boston, remarks: "Practitioners are laureated 
gratis with a title feather of Doctor. Potecaries, Surgeons & Midwifes are 
dignified ace. to Successe" (Sloane MS. 4062, fol. 235 r°). Checkley, in Dr. 
Slafter's phrase, kept "a variety store," and "in this little shop he sold books 
and medicines, and such small articles of merchandise as would command a 
ready sale in a thriving New England village" (i. 13). 

2 "A distinguished, & a diminutive Crue of Odd people here, when they could 
find no other Darts to throw at me, imagined their not finding my name in the 
printed List of the Royal Society, would enable them to detect me of an Impos- 
ture, for affixing an F. R. S. unto my Name, on some Just Occasions for it. And 
an Infamous Fellow, whose name is John Checkley, a Sorry Toyyjian, (that yett 
had the Impudence to write as a Divine) wrote a Letter full of Scandalous In- 
vectives against me, which was pubhckly read in the Royal Society. This wretched 
Man, ambitious to do the part of a Divine, printed here some Rapsodies, to 
prove, That the God whom K. William, and the Christians of New England, have 
Worshipped, is the D — I — A young and a Bright Kinsman of mine, bestowed such 
Castigations on the Blasphemer, that I became thereupon the object of his Im- 
placable Revenges" (Mather to Jurin, May 21, 1723; printed by N. Darnell 
Davis, see p. 90 note 4, above: I follow the Gay MS., fols. 174-175). 

Mr. Darnell Davis's copy unfortunately made Mather call Checkley "a Sorry 
Toryman" instead of "Toyman." The latter term describes Checkley by his 
occupation, since he kept a "variety store." Toy, in the language of Mather's 
time meant, not merely "plaything," but "any small or trifhng object." Mather's 
remark that Checkley "had the Impudence to write as a Divine'^ refers to the 
fact that Checkley's anonymous tract. Choice Dialogues, professed to be "By a 
Reverend and Laborious Pastor in Christ's Flock, by One who has been, for almost 
twice thirty years, a faithful & Painful Labourer in Christ's Vine-yard." 

Dr. Slafter (John Checkley, i. 48) regards the charge which Mather brings 
against Checkley of "printing some rhapsodies to prove that the God whom K. 
William and the Christians of New England have worshipped is the Devil "^as 
quite unjustified by the language of the tract. I must say, however, that a care- 
ful scrutiny of Checkley's words (Slafter, i. 152-153) leaves upon my mind the 
impression that Mather has not seriously distorted their implication. Checkley 
certainly allows the Countryman to say that a certain doctrine of high Calvinism 
"seems all Blasphemy to me; to represent the infinit Goodness and Father of 
Mercies, in the Colours of Cruelty it self, that you cou'd not exceed it in the 
Description of the Devil !" and the Minister (who voices the author's sentiments) 
seems rather to justify the Countryman by remarking, "Therefore the Lutherans 
have charg'd the Calvinists with Worshipping the Devil," and by explaining their 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society 101 

and to have prompted Mather's constant friend, Dr. John Wood- 
ward, to write to Mather inquiring what the trouble was. IMather 
rephed, in November, 1721, explaining his relations with Checkley, 
and (no doubt) begging Woodward for some assurance as to his 
actual status. 

I have said that Woodward was Mather's constant friend. This 
will come out clearly in the sequel, but it is satisfactory to know for 
certain that in the very month in which Checkley was penning his 
missive to Halley, Woodward had written (Ai)ril 3, 1721) to jNIather 
in the most friendly manner, explaining the failure of the Philosophical 
Transactions to print some of Mather's communications on the 
ground that "the Editors, since Mr. Wallers Death, are very neglect- 
full & partial; by which the Society suffers not a little," and adding: 
"For my own Part I have not been wanting in Doing you Justice: 
and makeing the Curious here sensible of your Diligence there." ^ 

I have said that Mather wrote to Dr. Woodward in November, 
1721, giving him an account, in response to an inquiry, of the quarrel 
which had led to Checkley's missive to Halley. This fact, and this 
date, may be gathered from a passage in Mather's subsequent letter 
to Jurin.^ But we have other evidence, enabling us to fix the date 
with exactness, for in Mather's Diary, under November 30, 1721, 
occurs the following entry: 

Writing letters for Europe, I send over many Things, that I hope, will 
serve the Kingdom of GOD. And particularly, among the rest, I \\Tite a 
further and a more distinct Account of the Small-pox inoculated, the 



logical process in arriving at this conclusion. True, Checkley does not make the 
Minister accept the position of the Lutherans in so many words, but the Minister 
certainly appears to have no objection to it. 

1 1 Massachusetts Historical Proceedings, xiii. 110-111. On the same date 
(ibid.) Woodward writes to John Winthrop (H. C. 1700), whom Mather had 
brought into epistolary relations with him about 1718 (4 Massachusetts Histor- 
ical Collections, viii. 428). He thanks Winthrop for shells, asks for fossils and 
Indian bgnes and utensils, and mentions Mather: "EF Mather has said nothing, 
as yet about the Water Doves that you Sent Him." On the water dove see 
Collections, as above, viii. 435, 436. 

* "But of this matter I gave jy Woodward a more full Account, a year and 
half ago." "I shall keep such Terms, as I used unto my Doctor, when he had 
what he required [i. e., requested] of me upon it" (Mather to Jurin, May 21, 1723, 
Gay MS., fol. 175). Eighteen months before May, 1723, would be November, 
1721. 



102 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

Method and Success of it among us, and the Opposition to it; By which 
Means, I hope, some hundreds of thousands of Lives, may in a little 
while come to be preserved. 

The document to which this entry particularly refers is easily 
identified. It was a formal communication to the Royal Society, 
addressed to Dr. Woodward, and entitled " A further Account of the 
Method and Success of the Small-pox Inoculated," — under which 
title it stands catalogued, in Mather's handwriting, in a list of 
Curiosa Americana which were certainly sent to the Society (addressed 
to Woodward) at about this time.^ With every such packet of 
scientific communications it was Mather's habit to send a covering 
letter, of a more personal and informal character, and it was, we 
may be sure, in the personal letter to Woodward (enclosing the 
" Further Account " and other communications) that Mather replied 
to Dr. Woodward's inquiry about the trouble with Checkley which 
had prompted the latter to despatch his extraordinary epistle to 
Halley. Thus we are enabled to assign Mather's reply to Wood- 
ward's inquiry to a precise date, — November 30, 1721. 

One question, of immense significance, emerges from our jejune 
collation of dates and documents: — Was not the agitation concern- 
ing Mather's right to wear the title of F. R. S. — started (it seems) by 
Checkley in 1720 — furthered and intensified by the inoculation con- 
troversy in Boston? ^ This controversy broke out in June, 1721, 
when Mather issued (in manuscript) his Address to the Physicians.^ 

* This list (in the possession of the American Antiquarian Society) consists 
of thirteen titles and is headed: "Curiosa Americana, Continued — In letters 
to D"^ John Woodward." It is the table of contents once belonging to a sheaf 
of draughts which have perished, while it survives, a loose leaf laid in a MS. 
volume of other draughts (also of Curiosa). The same list of thirteen articles 
occurs (with variations in some of the titles) in the catalogue enclosed in Mather's 
letter to Jurm, May 21, 1723 (Gay MS., fols. 179-181). There is much to be 
said about these thirteen Curiosa, but this is not the place to discuss them. I 
could make it practically certain, if space allowed, that the third of the thirteen 
was the "further Account" mentioned in the Diary, November 30, 1721. 

2 See Dr. Reginald H. Fitz's admirable paper, Zabdiel Boylston, Inoculator, 
and the Epidemic of Smallpox in Boston in 1721 (The Johns Hopkins Hospital 
Bulletin, No. 247, September, 1911, xxii. 315-327). 

* For the date, June 6, 1721, see A Vindication of the Ministers of Boston, 
1722 (dated at the end, January 30, 1721-2), p. 7, and [Isaac Greenwood,] A 
Friendly Debate; or A Dialogue between Academicus; and Sawny & Mundun- 
gus, 1722 (dedication dated February 15, 1721-2), pp. 5-6. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society 103 

The Royal Society was keenly interested, and news from the seat of 
war was always welcome. The first inoculation in Boston was per- 
formed by Zabdiel Boylston, at Mather's instance, on June 2G, 1721,^ 
and it is possible that Mather apprised Dr. Woodward of it imme- 
diately, in a letter of June 29th.^ It is certain, at any rate, that on 
September 25th Dr. William Douglass, the vociferous and determined 
opponent of IMather and Boylston, wrote from Boston to Alexander 
Stuart, M. D., F. R. S., in London,^ inquiring what EngUsh physicians 
thought of "tliis rash practice," expressing his own opposition to it, 
and describing IMather as "a certain credulous Preacher of this 
place." His letter was read before the Royal Society, presumably 
by Stuart, on November 16, 1721.^ The Englfeh doctors, of course, 
were not all of one mind. Dr. James Jurin, the Secretary of the 
Royal Society, was much in favor of inoculation.^ Dr. Stuart's atti- 
tude I do not know, but his public reading of Douglass's letter looks 
unfriendly to the practice. 

Early in 1722 Douglass put forth an anti-inoculation tract, in the 
form of a Letter to Stuart, dated December 20, 1721, in which he 
twits ]\Iather on his correspondence with the Royal Society. "A 
certain Reverend Gentleman of the Town," he calls him, "a INIan of 
Whim and Credulity," who thought the outbreak of the smallpox 
" a fit Opportunity to make Experiments on his Neighbours, (which 
in his Vanity he might judge acceptable to the Royal Society)." ^ 

1 Boylston, An Historical Account of the Small-Pox Inoculated, 1726, p. 2. 

* On this date Mather remarks, in his Diary, "I am writing for London, and 
sending more Things to serve the Kingdome of God." 

' For Stuart, see Nichols, Literary Anecdotes, ii. 95, n.* He died on September 
15, 1742. 

* The letter is preserved in the Letter-Book of the Royal Society, D. 2. f. 2 
(Gay MS., fol. 259-261). It is endorsed as "read Nov'. 16. 1721." 

* On Jurin, see Nichols, Illustrations of the Literary History of the Eighteenth 
Century, v. 122; Literary Anecdotes, vi. 92-93, n. §§, ix. 506. He died March 22, 
1749-50, in his 66th year. For his interest in inoculation, and the eagerness with 
which he welcomed news on the subject from New England, see especially his 
essay entitled A Letter to the Learned Dr. Caleb Cotesworth . . . ; containing 
a Comparison between the Danger of the Natural Small Pox, and of that given 
by Inoculation (Philosophical Transactions, No. 374, for November-December, 
1722, xxxii. 213-227), in which he quotes a letter from Mather, March 10, 1721-2 
(preserved in Sloane MS. 3324, fol. 260), and to which he appends an account 
from Captain John Osborne which, as he says, "confirms the E.xtract given above 
from Mr. Mather's Relation" (p. 225). 

* Inoculation of the Small Pox as practised in Boston, Consider'd in a Letter 



104 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS * [Dec. 

And again, near the end, he styles Mather "a certain Gentleman, 
(who you know in times past has been troublesome to the R. S. 
with his trivial credulous Stories)." ^ 

This last slur must have been particularly galling to Mather, who 
was rather sensitive about the delay which the Fellows of the Society 
sometimes showed in acknowledging his communications and about 
the failure of most of them to get into print. He betrays this feeling 
in writing to John Winthrop (H. C. 1700) ^ and also in some of his 
letters to his correspondents in the Society.^ Indeed, he had appar- 
ently been unable to conceal his sensitiveness from his associates in 
Boston, — even from Douglass himself, with whom, before this 
quarrel about inoculation, he had been on excellent terms.^ Douglass 
adverts to the matter again in a letter to Cadwallader Golden (May 
1, 1722), in which he characterizes "Mather, Jr." as "a credulous 
vain preacher," and alleges that he "set inoculation at work" in 
order " that he might have something to send home to the Royal So- 
ciety who had long neglected his communications as he complained." ^ 

Douglass's sneers did not pass unnoticed by Mather's friends, and 
it is particularly instructive to observe the way in which Isaac Green- 
wood expresses himself in February, 1722,^ on this point of Mather's 
connection with the Royal Society, in his little masterpiece of con- 
troversial raillery, the Dialogue between Academicus, and Sawny 
and Mundungus. "He," says Academicus (Greenwood) to Sawny 
(Douglass), "has been above Forty Years a Celebrated Preacher, 
and has been so acknowledged by Foreign Universities, as no American 
ever was before him, and justly merited the Honour of being a Member 
of the ROYAL SOCIETY." ^ Greenwood's challenge was instantly 



to A S M. D. & F. R. S. in London (Boston, 1722), pp. 1-2. The tract, 

though anonymous, was well known to be by Douglass. 

1 P. 20. 

2 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 440, 444, 448, 449, 452, 453, 455. 

3 To Woodward, July, 1716, and July 25, 1717 (M. H. S.); to Jurin, May 21, 
1723 (Gay MS., fol. 175). Cf. Woodward's letter to Mather, April 3, 1721 (1 
Massachusetts Historical Proceedings, xiii. 111). 

< [Isaac Greenwood,] A Friendly Debate, 1722, pp. 19-20. 

s 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, ii. 169. 

* The dedication ("To my very Worthy Physician, Mr. Zabdiel Boylston") 
is dated "E musceo meo, Feb. 15. 1721, 2." 

^ A Friendly Debate; or, A Dialogue, between Academicus; and Sawny & 
Mundungus (Boston, 1722), p. 13. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society 105 

accepted in an anonymous Dialogue between Rusticus and Aca- 
demicus,^ which is dedicated in mockery "To the ^'e^y Reverend 
and Learned Dr. Cotton Mather, Fellow of the Royal Society." 
In the Advertisement prefixed, the anonymous author takes pains to 
refer to "C. M. D. D. and F. R. S.," and again (echoing Greenwood's 
phrases) to "the said C. ]M. (who has justly merited the Honour of 
being a Member of the ROYAL SOCIETY)." Further, in the 
course of his dialogue, he uses, as a kind of ipse dixit, the sentence, 
*'Dr. Cotton Mather {Felloio of the Royal' Society) says so." ^ Once 
more, when he is about to quote Oldmixon's violent attack ^ on the 
Magnalia, he prefaces it by repeating Greenwood's praise of Mather 
(which I have just quoted) word for word.'* And finally, in append- 
ing a document which he ascribes to ^Mather's son,^ he speaks of 
this young man as "an Academical Brother (Son to a Fellow of the 
Royal Society)." ^ 

All this does not, in strictness, denote a doubt of the genuineness 
of jMather's title of F. R. S., though it certainly is susceptible of that 
interpretation, in view of the fact that the question had already 
been raised among his enemies. But in this same year (1722) Doug- 
lass went to press with another Letter to Stuart,^ in which he not 
only ridiculed jMather's communications to the Royal Society,^ but 

1 A Friendly Debate; or, A Dialogue between Rusticus and Academicus, 
Boston, 1722. The dedication, burlesquing Greenwood's, is dated "From the 
South Side of my Hay-stack, March 9. 1721, 2." 

2 P. 2. 

' " WTiat Mr. Oldmixon says in his History of the British Colonies, Page 108, 
109." The work referred to is Oldmixon's British Empire in America, 1708, 
vol. i. 

* P. 5. 

' That is, of course, Samuel Mather (1706-1785), then (like Greenwood) a 
student in Harvard College, where he took his first degree in 1723. 

« P. 8. 

" The Abuses and Scandals of some late Pamphlets in Favour of Inoculation 
of the Small Pox, Modestly obviated, and Inoculation further considcr'd in a 

Letter to A S M. D. & F. R. S. in London. Boston, 1722. This is dated 

at the end "Feb. loth, 1721, 22." 

* Pp. 6-7. He refers particularly to three: (1) a letter to Woodward, November, 
1712, as reported in the Philosophical Transactions, xxLx. [64]; (2) the squaring 
of the circle; (3) "the Longitude at Sea." "The Quadrature of the Circle" was 
one of a series of twelve communications sent by Mather to John Chamberla}-ne, 
F. R. S., in February, 1720 (see catalogue enclosed in the letter to Jurin, May 21, 
1723, Gay MS., fol. 180; Mather to John Winthrop, December 26, 1720, and 



103 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

went so far as to suggest that the Society had repudiated him. " Per- 
haps," writes Douglass, *'he may oblige this his Alma Mater ^ to dis- 
own him for a Son, as it seems the Royal Society have abeady done, 
by omitting his Name in their yearly Lists." ^ 

Finally, on November 21, 1722, John Checkley sailed for Eng- 
land.^ By this time, in all human probability, Mather had learned 
that Checkley's letter of April 26, 1721, and Douglass's of September 
25, 1721, had been read before the Royal Society. No reply had 
come from Mather's letter of November 30, 1721, to Dr. Woodward ^ 
— we should remember that the postal service was irregular and 
precarious, and that packets were continually miscarrying. Stuart 
must have been regarded by Mather as a hostile influence within the 
Society. The fact that Douglass claimed Stuart as an old friend ^ 



March 12, 1722-3: 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 444, 455), In 
his letter to Winthrop on March 12, 1722-3, Mather writes: "Mr. Chamberlain 
tells me (and I feel it from other circumstances,) That my XII Letters to him 
have been published. And yett I have never to this Hour seen them." The 
"other circumstances" which in Mather's mind confirmed Chamberlayne's 
words, were, I suppose, this passage in Douglass's book, for Mather did not see 
•how Douglass could have known of his paper on squaring the circle unless it 
had been printed. But the essay is not known to exist, either in print or in manu- 
script. As for the paper on Longitude, that is not even mentioned in any of 
Mather's Usts of his Curiosa. I suspect it formed a part, either of this essay on 
the Circle or of some other letter of the twelve sent to Chamberlayne. If (as 
seems probable) these letters were not pubhshed, some member of the Society 
must have given Douglass his information, — Stuart, I should conjecture. 

1 That is, the University of Glasgow. Douglass is referring to Mather's 
degree of D. D. 

2 Introduction, p. [ii]. 

^ Sewall, Diary, iii. 312. Sewall says that Checkley sailed for London "in 
Barlow," — that is, in Captain Henry Barlow's vessel, probably the Hanover. 
At all events, that was Henry Barlow's vessel in June, 1721 ("Hen. Barlow, 
Hanover for London" is recorded as "outward bound" in the Boston News- 
Letter for June 29- July 3, 1721, No. 908, p. 2). Dr. Slafter inadvertently 
confuses the vessel with the captain and says that Checkley sailed "in the ship 
Barlow" (John Checkley, i. 49). Checkley reached Boston, on his return, on 
September 23, 1723 (cf. Slafter, i. 49, 50 n. 40, ii. 162, with the Boston Ga- 
zette, September 30, 1723, p. 4/1 — a reference which I owe to Mr. Albert 
Matthews). 

* No reply had reached Mather by May 21, 1723, as appears from his letter 
to Jurin of that date. 

^ Douglass begins his printed letter of February 15, 1721-2 (The Abuses and 
Scandals, etc.), with the words: "Our former Intimacy in our Travels and 
Study abroad is all the Apology I shall make for addressing you with this Letter." 



1911] COTTON MATHERS ELECTION INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 107 

and had dedicated two anti-Mather pamphlets to him ^ would in- 
evitably produce that impression, even if no report of Stuart's atti- 
tude (whatever that attitude may have been) had reached Boston. 
So^far as I know, IMather nowhere mentions Stuart, but there is a 
bare possibility that he alludes to him in a letter to Woodward, dated 
September 21, 1724. This letter is devoted to the famous Am- 
phisbsena, immortalized by Whittier (with the inevitable fling at 
Cotton Mather) in his poem of The Double-headed Snake of New- 
bury. Here JNIather subscribes himself "one, who forever wishes 
your Protection from the AmphisbcBJia in humane Shape among you." ^ 
Perhaps this is Stuart, whose other head may have been Douglass! 
But another interpretation is far more probable. 

At all events, by the spring of 1723, .there were reasons enough 
why ]\Iather should think it high time to put an end to the current 
discussion as to his right to call himself an F. R. S. He had no 
doubt — it is inconceivable that he should have had any doubt — 
that he was fully justified in wearing that title; but the situation was 
awkward, and some action on his part seemed advisable. Accord- 
ingly, on INIay 21, 1723, he addressed a straightforward and cir- 



In his Practical Essay concerning the Small Pox (Boston, 1730), which is dedicated 
to Stuart, Douglass is more specific: "Our former Intimacy in the Universities 
in Holland and Hospitals in Flanders, inclined me to this Address." 

' Inoculation of the Small Pox as practised in Boston (1722) and The Abuses 
and Scandals (1722). 

2 Royal Society Letter-Book, M. 2. 47 (Gay MS., fol. 222). Mather's draught 
(dated September 21, 1724) is in M. H. S. Mather's informant as to the New- 
bury monster was the Rev. Christopher Toppan (see an extract from Toppan's 
letter of July 6, 1724, in Joshua Coffin's History of Newbury, 1845, p. 195). 
Unfortunately Mather's words in the letter to Woodward are ambiguous; "your 
Protection" may mean either "protection at your hands" or "protection for 
you." If the latter is the sense (as the context makes probable), Mather may be 
alluding to Dr. Richard Mead (1673-1754), who had attacked Woodward with a 
sword and put him in danger of his life in 1719. Woodward's o^\ti account of the 
affray (headed "Relation of a Duel," and dated June 13, 1719) may be read in 
Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, \-i. 641-642 (from The Weekly Journal, London, 
June 20, 1719) ; cf. vi. 212 ff. Woodward had sent Mather an account of the afTuir, 
which he received in July, 1720, and sent to John Winthrop (Mather to V\\n- 
throp, July 15, 1720, 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, viii. 440). ^Lather's 
reply to Woodward, July 27, 1720, is in A. A. S. Mather also sent Winthrop, 
on August 29, 1720, a copy of liis reply to Woodward (viii. 442), which Wood- 
ward acknowledged as a "very civil Letter of the later End of last Summer" 
on April 3, 1721 (1 Massachusetts Historical Proceedings, xiii. 110). 



108 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

cumstantlal letter to Dr. James Jurin, then Secretary of the Society, 
reciting the facts of his election as he had understood them from 
Waller and Woodward, mentioning that both Halley and Petiver 
had adorned him with the letters F. R. S. in printed works (the 
former in the Philosophical Transactions itself), saying that he had 
been accused of imposture for using the title on appropriate occasions, 
and requesting Jurin to give him an authoritative and final decision 
as to whether he was or was not an F. R. S. I do not see how a man 
in jNIather's position could have expressed himself in better taste than 
he shows in the following sentences, near the close of this letter to Jurin: 

But if after all, it be the pleasure of those Honourable Persons, who 
compose or Govern the Royal Society, that I should lay aside my preten- 
sions to be at all Related -unto that Illustrious Body upon the least 
Signification of it by your pen, it shall be dutifully complied withal. I 
will only continue to take the leave of still communicating Annually to 
you (as long as I live) what Curiosa Americana I can become the possessor 
of. For (my Jewish Rabbis having taught me, to Love y^ Work and have 
little Regard unto the Rabbinate) it is not the Title, but the Service, that is 
the Heighth, & indeed the "WTiole of my Ambition.^ 

And to prove that he was in earnest in his protestations, he enclosed 
an elaborate manuscript tract on inoculation (a subject in which he 
knew that Jurin was profoundly interested), and promised other 
communications in about a fortnight.^ That he kept liis word is 



1 I take this from the transcript in the Gay MS. (fol. 177), which seems to 
be a more exact copy than that printed by Mr. Darnell Davis. 

2 "As a Token of my purposes this way, and as an Earnest, of a much greater 
Variety, which I propose to send you by another Hand, about a Fortnight hence, 
I now present you with a tedious account of Sentiments & Occurrents, relating 
to a Subject, about which I perceive you are sollicitous to have y^ exactest In- 
formations" (Gay MS., fols. 177-178). What we know of Jurin would justify us 
in conjecturing that this subject was inoculation (cf. p. 103, above), but we can 
have certainty, for, in a later letter to Jurin (June 10, 1723), introducing Isaac 
Greenwood ("One of o' Inoculates"), Mather says: "a few Days ago, I wrote 
you a Large Account of the Success w"*^ the Small Pox Inoculated has had hi 
these parts of the World" (Gay MS., fol. 210). He refers to this account again 
in a letter to Jurin, October 5, 1724: — "I should not have been sorry, if my 
Letter to you. Justifying the Inoculation of the Small-pox, had been pubhshed : — 
might it at all have contributed unto the more General Entertainment, of so 
Marvellous, — but, alas, how Satanically despised — a Blessing" (Gay MS., 
fol. 255). 

We may confidently identify with "the tedious account" thus despatched to 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into the royal society 109 

shown by a series of seven letters to Jurin (June 3-8, 10, 1723) in the 
archives of the Royal Society.^ Evidently INIather wished to dem- 
onstrate that he really meant to be serviceable, whether or not the 
Society should confirm him in his title. 

Turin's reply to IMather's letter has not been found. Mr. Darnell 
Davis, in printing the document, remarks that it would be interesting 
to know what it was, and adds: 

A diligent search among tlie records of the Society has, however, 
failed to find that Cotton Mather's name was ever submitted to tlie gen- 
eral body of Fellows. Would it be an undue surmise to suspect that 
Cotton Mather's mistaken zeal in the witchcraft heresy stood in the way 
of his obtaining a two-thirds vote [i. e., in 1713, when his name passed the 
Council], 2 and that, the Council finding this the case, did not risk a 
rejection? ^ 

Dr. Slafter, after quoting these words, with approval, continues 
with another suggestion: 

But in addition to this, his Sermon before the General Court in Boston 
in 1C90 had been published, and was by no means flattering to the mem- 
bers of the Church of England. His open and violent hostility to the 
Church, and abusive language concerning it must have been known, and 
could not have gained for him many friends among the Fellows of the 
Royal Society, who were, we presume, mostly prominent members of 
the Church of England.^ 

And now we arrive at the two pieces of fresh evidence which are 
my only excuse for the present paper. 
Several months ago I came across an entry in the Diary of the 



Jurin on May 21, 1723, a letter of which the draught (in Mather's hand) is in 
A. A. S. It is dated May 4, 1723, is headed "The Case of the Small-Pox Inocu- 
lated; further Cleared. To D'' James Jurin," and occupies twenty-one pages of 
manuscript. It well deserves printing. 

1 Copies are in the Gay MS., fols. 181-209. Mather's original draughts are 
in A. A. S. Two of these letters were read at meetings of the Society (as en- 
dorsements in the Letter-Book show), — that of June 7 ("The Land Sail'd upon") 
on December 5, and that of June 10 ("A Singular Case") on December 12, 1723. 
The covering letter (June 10, 1723) introduces the bearer of the packet, Isaac 
Greenwood. 

2 Passage in brackets mine. 

' The Nation, liv. 128; Register, xlvi. 117. 
* Slafter, John Checkley, i. 47. 



110 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

distinguished antiquary, Ralph Thoresby, F. R. S., under date of 
April 11, 1723: 

Afternoon: transcribing rest of Mr. Thomas Milner's will and bene- 
factions, till four, at the Royal Society; I gave my vote for the Rev. 
Mr. Williams, to be librarian; and keeper of the Museum; he had more 
votes than most of the eight candidates, yet was outdone by one, viz., 
Mr. Hawkesby; after I had voted for Mr. Cotton Mather to be F. R. S. 
returned in time for prayers. This was a very large convention of the 
Society; I met with good old Dr. SI. . . .^ and other ancient acquaint- 
ance, and never saw so great a number of the Fellows together, three 
rooms almost filled ; Dr. Tancred Robinson and I sat on the same chair.^ 

Of course this entry left no doubt in my mind that the Royal 
Society balloted on the name of Cotton Mather on the 11th of April, 
1723, in the afternoon. The startling thing was the date, — almost 
ten years later than the letter from Waller quoted by Samuel Mather. 
It remained to consult the records of the Society, which, it was to 
be hoped, would clear up the mystery. Professor Ernest W. Brown, 
of Yale University, himself an F. R. S., was so kind as to forward 
my queries to the proper quarter, and the response was prompt 
and satisfactory. I have a letter ^ from Robert Harrison, Esq., 
Assistant Secretary and Librarian, containing the following extract 
from the MS. Journal of the Society for April 11, 1723: 

Dr. Woodward informed the President that Dr. Cotton Mather of New 
England was recommended many years ago to the Society for a Fellow, 
and had also upon a reference to the Council past their approbation in 
order to be ballotted for in the Society, which was never yet done, he 
therefore desired that the said gentleman might be now ballotted for, 
which being granted. Dr. Cotton Mather was elected a Fellow. 

Mather's appeal to Jurin, we observe, had been effectually answered 
before it was written. It bears date May 21, 1723, and the Society 

^ Sir Hans Sloane. 

2 The Diary of Ralph Thoresby, F. R. S., ed. Hunter, 1830, ii. 366. Thoresby 
himself was admitted into the Royal Society in 1701. He notes the ceremonies 
which we have already heard of in this discussion: — "This being the first time 
I was at London since my admission into the Royal Society, I subscribed my name 
in the book; the formality of the Vice-President's taking me by the hand and 
publicly pronouncing me (in the name of the Society) a Fellow of the Royal 
Society, . . . may be seen in my Diary" (i. 339-340). 

3 November 16, 1911. 



1911] COTTON AUTHERS ELECTION INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 111 

had already acted, at the instance of Woodward, on the 11th of April. 
The inquiry provoked by the pugnacious Checkley had operated in 
a way its originator little expected. ^Yoodwa^d, we remember, had 
written to Mather, and Mather had replied.^ Investigation of the 
Society's records had doubtless followed, and the awkward blunder 
of ten years before had come to light. For this blunder INIather was 
obviously not responsible. It was Waller, if anybody, who was to 
blame; for he had certainly informed ]\Iather that he had been elected 
in 1713 both by the Council and by the body of Fellows. The Coun- 
cil's vote was correctly entered in the ^Minutes, but no record could 
be found of Mather's election by the Society. Perhaps there had been 
an informality in the balloting; perhaps there w^as an omission in 
the record. Waller, who had nominated IMather, and who, as 
Secretary, should have entered his election (if it took place) in the 
Journal,^ had been dead for several years.^ There was only one way 
to set things right, — to abide by the face of the record, to assume 
that no ballot had been taken by the Society in 1713, and to proceed 
to such a ballot at this late day. Woodward stated the facts, in 
open meeting, to the President, Sir Isaac Ne\si;on, and asked for a 
ballot. And so, at last. Cotton ]\Iather vras duly elected a Fellow of 
the Roj'al Society on the 11th of April, 1723. It was still impossible 
for him to fulfil the technical condition of attending a meeting within 
four weeks, signing the obligation, receiving the right-hand of fellow- 
ship, and thus undergoing the ceremony of admission. But all this, 
in his case, was clearly regarded as of no immediate consequence. 
It is ridiculous to imagine that the Society elected him, under these 
exceptional circumstances, with the intention that his election should 



» See pp. 101-102, above. 

^ The Statutes provide that "the Election and Admission of every person 
into the Society, with the time thereof, shall be recorded in the Jonmal-book " 
(Chap, vi., sect. 7, p. 83). 

' I have not found the date of Richard Waller's death. Thoresby paid him a 
call on August 14, 1714 (Diary, ii. 251), and says nothing about his being in poor 
health. Weld gives November 30, 1714, as the date when he ceased to be Secretary 
(History of the Royal Society, ii. 561). Dr. Woodward, on April 3, 1721, speaks 
of his death as if it were not recent (1 Massachusetts Historical Proceedings, 
xiii. 111). A passage in a letter from IMather to Dr. Woodward, July, 1716 
(M. H. S.), mentions "our dear Mr. Waller" in a way which, taken in connection 
with the rest of the letter, makes me think that he is referring to him as a de- 
parted friend. 



112 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

become void in a month, — before he could be informed of it, in- 
deed! We must suppose that the statutory proviso ("or within 
such further time, as shall be granted by the Society or the Council, 
upon cause shewed to either of them ") was meant to go into effect 
in his case; and meantime, we may be sure, the Society expected 
him to annex the F. R. S. to his name. Otherwise, their action is 
■unintelligible. 

Less than four years later, on January 9, 1727, a new section was 
added to the Statute, in order to provide for just such cases of per- 
sons Uving at a distance: 

Every person, who is a foreigner, and every one of his* Majesty's sub- 
jects, whose habitation or usual place of residence is at more than forty 
miles distance from London, shall be and be deemed a Fellow of the 
Society, immediately after he shall be elected, and shall be registered in 
the Journal-book of the Society as such: Provided always, that no 
such person shall have liberty to vote at any Election or meeting of the 
Society, before he shall be qualified pursuant to the Statutes. And if 
he shall neglect so to qualify himself, the first time he comes to London, 
when he may be present at a meeting of the Society, and can be admitted ; 
his Election shall be declared void, and his name shall be cancelled in the 
Register.^ 

This section was, I suppose, not retroactive, and it has therefore 
no legal significance in the case of Cotton Mather, except perhaps to 
indicate that, in spite of his election, he was never, in the full technical 
sense of the term, a Fellow of the Royal Society. One thing, how- 
ever, must now be clear, — that the Society did its utmost to make 
him a Fellow, and that, from 1723 until his death, he was an F. R. S. 
elect, lacking only the formality of a ceremonial admission. And the 
lack of this ceremony, we should remember, did not, according to 
the practice of the Society, deprive Americans of the right to be 
styled and to style themselves Fellows of the Royal Society --- as we 
have seen already in the case of Paul Dudley.^ 

Thoresby's account of the meeting at which Mather was finally 
elected is particularly interesting. It was, he tells us, "a very large 
convention of the Society." He "never saw so great a number of the 
Fellows together." The assembly was so crowded that he and Dr. 

1 Diplomata et Statuta, 1752, pp. 83-84. 

2 See p. 96, above. 



1911] COTTON Mather's election into tiie royal society 113 

Tancred Robinson had to "sit on the same chair." ^ Now it was 
well known to the meeting that Cotton INIather had been erroneously 
describing himself as an F. R. S. for nine years past. Their action, 
therefore, in electing him on this occasion is more eloquent than 
words. They were not offended at what he had done. They perceived 
that he had acted under an innocent — indeed, an unavoidable — 
misapprehension, and, in this large meeting, they corrected the error 
of their deceased Secretary and rehabilitated Mather in a w^ay not 
less honorable to themselves than to him. Few men have ever 
received a more striking and brilliant vindication. John Checkley 
was in England at the time.^ I trust he got early news of the 
occurrence. 

It may seem to many persons, as it did to Dr. Slafter, "a matter 
of very little importance whether Dr. Mather was, or was not, a 
Fellow of the Royal Society." ^ But it certainly is of some conse- 
quence to know whether he was, or was not, a shameless impostor. 
It is of some consequence to know that, in using the letters F. R. S. 
from 1714 to 1723, he was acting in good faith and in a w^ay that 
received the emphatic endorsement of the Society. And it is at 
least very pleasant to feel sure that when, after the vote of April 11, 
1723, he appended this title to his name (as he did, for example, in 
Successive Generations in 1725, and in the inscription under Peter 
Pelham's mezzotint likeness of him in 1727) he was proceeding in 
the strictest accordance with the desire and purpose of the Roj-al 
Society itself, as expressed in the plainest manner at a very large 
meeting of that august body. 

How or when Mather was informed of his final election we do not 
know, — doubtless in an official notice from the Secretary, Dr. Jurin, 
and perhaps also in a private letter from Dr. Woodward. His replies 
would be good reading if we had them. His correspondence with 



1 The reason for so large an attendance was doubtless the election of a Libra- 
rian and Keeper of the Museum in place of Alban Thomas. Thoresby refers to 
the meeting again in a letter to Richard Richardson, M. D., June 21, 1723 (printed 
by Nichols, Illustrations of the Literary History of the Eighteenth Century, i. 
810) : — "I never saw such a number of the Fellows as upon that occasion; three 
rooms almost full." He mentions the fact that there were "many candidates put 
in for [Thomas's] place." 

* See p. 106 note 3, above. 

' John Checkley, i. 40. 



114 THE COLONIAL SOCIETY OF MASSACHUSETTS [Dec. 

the Society continued. On August 3, 1723, he gave John Perkins, 
his family physician, a letter of introduction to Jurin.^ In the early 
autumn of 1724 he despatched a set of "Curiosa Americana con- 
tinued. In a Decad of Letters to D' John Woodward and D"" James 
Jurin." 2 On October 5, 1724, he wrote a letter to Jurin introducing 
Howard Wyborn,^ and on the 15th of the following December a 
letter introducing Zabdiel Boylston.^ No later communications are 
preserved, if any were ever sent. The letter of October 5 is especially 
interesting, for it expresses, in its opening sentences, the satisfaction 
that Mather felt in the action of the Society in perfecting his title 
and his sense of gratitude to Jurin himself. I shall quote the passage 
in full, as a fit conclusion to our study of Cotton Mather's Election 
into the Royal Society: 

You have so encouraged me, by the kind Reception, which my former 
communications have had with you, and by your Means with my Illus- 
trious Masters, that I cannot but in my poor way, continue them. I 
wish that they had been more valuable for Curiosity or Erudition. But 
they are what I have. And you will have the Goodness to consider me, 
as a man exceeding full of employments: Able but now & then after a 
Mean Manner to express my zeal for your Noble Design. Tis indeed 
nothing but that well-meaning Zeal, that can bespeak for me, the Room 
you are pleas'd to allow me in a Society which I esteem as one of the 
most Illustrious in the World. 



» Royal Society Letter-Book, M. 2. 45 (Gay MS., fols. 211-213). 

2 Letter-Book, M. 2, 46-55 (Gay MS., fols. 213-253). The letters are dated 
October 1, and September 21-26, 28-30, 1724 (the year being omitted in the 
last). The letter of September 21 concerns the Amphisbsena of Newbury (see 
p. 107, above). That of September 23 describes the storm and high tide of Feb- 
ruary 24, 1723-4, and has been printed in 4 Massachusetts Historical Collections, 
viii. 456-457. Draughts of all these ten letters, except that on the storm, are in 
M. H. S. 

» Letter-Book, M. 2. 56 (Gay MS., fols. 253-256). 

4 Letter-Book, M. 2. 57 (Gay MS., fols. 256-259). 



LBAg'l2 






COTTON MATHER'S ELECTION 
INTO THE ROYAL SOCIETY 



BY 

GEORGE LYMAN KITTREDGE 



